Chapter 10
Lani
God, how could I have been so stupid? I actually let myself believe for a second that Evan cared for me and that he may have even fallen in love with me like he claimed. Like a fool, I let myself get suckered—getting into bed with him and allowing him to fuck me into oblivion like some slut. Once he was done, he immediately kicked me out of his bed like a cheap, dirty whore—so filthy, he had to insist I take a shower. He took an amazingly beautiful, life-changing moment for me and turned it into my worst nightmare. Now, I find myself in a crumpled heap on the shower floor, sobbing and bawling my eyes out, feeling so used. I’ve probably been sitting here for over an hour, just letting the water rain down on me. The water may wash away my tears, but I don’t think it can ever remove the filthiness I feel at having been rejected so callously after experiencing the best sex in my life.
Telling myself that I can’t stay like this forever, I get up, wipe away my tears, and shut off the water. As I turn the knob, I vindictively hope that his water bill goes up at the end of the month. I towel off and head to bed. Laying curled up into a ball, Evan’s rejection replays in my head and the tears start to fall again. I feel so alone. A part of me had held out hope that I’d find Evan waiting for me in my room after I finished with my shower, discovering that it was all a big misunderstanding. But even if I had misread the situation, his absence and his not seeking me out prove that he just wanted me for sex. Now that he’s accomplished his goal, he no longer has any use for me. I wind up crying myself to sleep—so physically, emotionally, and mentally worn out.
I wake up after only a few hours of sleep, feeling sore and confused. As the memories of what happened earlier this morning come flooding back, the hurt and sadness threaten to overwhelm me. I had experienced the most gratifying sex in my entire life, and at the time, I was happy and carefree, hopeful of a future with Evan. I had lowered my guard and made myself vulnerable to him, only to have it blow up in my face.
He ruined it all by coming up with some lame excuse to quickly get rid of me. Seriously, who was he trying to kid? We’re both well-educated adults and know full well that cleaning your hoohah after a guy loads it up with sperm isn’t going to prevent a pregnancy. If anything, his insisting I go take a shower was just proof that he didn’t trust me. I don’t want a baby either, and I responsibly take my birth control like clockwork. I’ve never missed a pill in the ten years I’ve been on it. The more I think about this, the more I get pissed off—at myself, him, and the whole situation. I finally admitted to myself that I wanted him and opened myself up for rejection. And even if I was okay with the fact that he used my body last night, I still only got a piece of him. He didn’t open himself up to me—I was the only one vulnerable in the wee hours of the morning and that’s what bothers me the most.
I decide to slip out and go downstairs to the gym. I hardly ever exercise, but I need to work out my aggression...or at least replace the pain in my heart with a more bearable ache. I walk straight out the door, thankful he’s not up and about—delaying my eventual confrontation with him.
Evan
I roll over and reach for Alani, only to come up empty. Assuming she’s in the bathroom, I continue to lay in bed, rubbing the sleep from my eyes. I smile, recalling all the different ways I took her and look forward to repeating some of them when she gets back. I have to put off cumming in her pussy again until I restock my supply of condoms, but I’m sure we can find some work around until then. I grin as I get hard thinking about what I’m going to do to her. I glance at the clock and I’m surprised to see how late I got up. I must have been more worn out from the sex than I thought, otherwise, I’d have taken her a lot sooner than now. After a few more minutes of waiting, I drag my ass out of the bed and search for her. The need to get back inside of her is making me restless.
I check my bathroom and she’s not there. When I walk into her bedroom, it’s empty. I search the rest of my home, but there’s no sign of her. What the fuck? Where could she have gone? I start to worry and imagine all the things that could possibly go wrong. I’m fucking pissed that she’d take such a stupid risk by leaving the penthouse knowing security won’t be here for another thirty minutes. Why couldn’t she just wait, or at least have woken me up so I could go with her?
As I pick up the phone to start calling around, she walks through the door. I immediately go to her, relieved to see her safe. She doesn’t acknowledge my presence and tries to avoid me, heading straight for her room. It sets me off that she doesn’t bother to speak to me when I was so worried about her. I grab her arm to stop her and angrily demand, “Where the fuck were you?”
“Go to hell, Evan!” she snaps at me, shaking off my hold on her and avoiding eye contact.
Wait, what?! SHE is pissed??? “Where the fuck were you?” I repeat in a menacing tone.
“I said go to hell!” she shouts at me.
“Why are you pissed? I’m the one who woke up not knowing where you were! You left, knowing there’s a lunatic stalking you. Don’t pull this shit again!”
“I stayed in the building, jackass. I went down to the gym.”
“Then leave a fucking note next time!” God! Why can’t she understand how her careless decisions affects other people?
“Believe it or not, Evan, you’re not the boss of me.” She finally turns towards me. One look at her face and I can tell she’d been crying.
“Look, I’m not trying to boss you around, I’m just trying to keep you safe,” I try to calmly explain. As I feel my anger start to ease, I try to figure out what the hell her problem is. “You hardly ever go to the gym. Why now?”
“I needed to think,” she replies.
“About?”
“Last night.”
And there it is. I knew she’d regret it. “Damn it! I never should have agreed to it. ”
“I knew you regretted it! Don’t worry, I took the shower you wanted me to take. Though, it’s stupid of you to think it would actually prevent a pregnancy!” she spits out.
“Wait, you think I regret last night???” I’m so confused.
“Why else would you demand that I get out of your bed? You finally got what you wanted and now you’re done with me. I needed you and you just used me.”
“Alani, I don’t regret sleeping with you. I know it was stupid to ask you to shower afterwards, but I panicked after realizing how I came inside you. I wasn’t thinking clearly and it was all I could come up with at the time.”
“What you’re basically saying, is that you didn’t trust me, like I wanted to trap you with a baby. Well I’ve got news for you—I don’t want a baby either. Last night, I wanted you—I wanted the connection. You kicked me out of your bed less than a minute after it was over!”
Hearing her perspective kills me. She gave herself to me and I kicked her out. I’m an idiot! I start to walk towards her and she throws her hand up to stop me.
“Stay away from me, Evan!” she warns before walking off. This time, I go after her.
“Alani, I’m sorry. I would never intentionally hurt you.”
“I can’t do this, Evan. My entire life, I’ve been pushed aside and made to feel alone. Last night, I finally realized that I might have feelings for you, but you didn’t want me.”
Shit. She finally just admitted to having feelings for me. I’ve waited so long to hear those words, but not like this. “I DO want you. I’ve wanted you the last three years, three months and twenty-one days. I love you, Alani.”
“You don’t love me, Evan. Just leave me alone...I’m done talking about this. Don’t say another damn word to me.”
“Christ, don’t do this. We were both happy last night, and it can be like that every night,” I plead.
“No, it can’t. Just leave me alone,” she says with finality.
After she leaves the room, I feel broken. The darkness that I’ve managed to keep at bay for so long starts to creep in around me.
Lani
Three weeks have passed and Evan and I still aren’t speaking. We went to Brayden and Missy’s gender reveal party earlier today, and after getting sick in the bathroom, Kerrigan asked if I could be pregnant. At first, I didn’t think it was possible, but she reminded me how the antibiotics I’d taken could interfere with the effectiveness of the birth control. Now, I’m a nervous wreck, and the more I think about the last couple days, the more I think it’s possible that I’m pregnant.
I’ve been vomiting a lot, but I don’t have any other symptoms to make me think that it’s the flu. I thought my boobs being sore lately may have been due to my upcoming period, but it’s never been one of my pre-menstrual symptoms. Evan needs to get his ass to bed so I can sneak out and get a pregnancy test. I need a confirmation either way...not knowing is driving me crazy and if I am pregnant, I’d rather deal with it sooner rather than later.
I start to head towards my bedroom, letting out a couple of fake yawns when Evan stops me, saying, “Alani?”
“Yeah?” I reply.
“I’m sorry,” he simply says. Shit. I know it’s a heartfelt apology and I feel a bit guilty for still holding a grudge, but I’m still stinging from what happened that night.
“Evan, I’m working on trying to forgive you, but you have to give me more time.” I do want to forgive him—I’m just not there yet.
“You’re right, I’ll try to give you as much time as you need. Thanks for staying and trying to work through this, but I do want you to know one thing...I do love you,” he tells me with an earnest look in his eyes. After a few moments, he heads to his bedroom with a parting, “Good night, Alani. ”
I can’t wait—I have to go now. As soon as Evan closes his bedroom door, I grab my keys and take off. I head to the twenty-four hour pharmacy, just a few miles away. Never in a million years would I have pictured myself standing in an aisle shopping for a pregnancy test for me to use. I pick the one that supposedly allows you to test three days early. When I get to the register, I dig the cash out of my wallet and pay for it. I ask the cashier where their bathroom is, and she points me to the back of the store.
Once I’m inside the bathroom, I tear the package open. I don’t want to leave any evidence in the trash at home, so I even throw the receipt out. Not that Evan would dig through the garbage, but I don’t want to take any chances. Three minutes later, I’m cursing myself for being so careless when ‘Pregnant’ pops up on the tiny screen. Son of a bitch. What will I tell Evan? Shit, he freaked out at the thought of just the possibility of it happening...how’s he going to react to this?! He’ll hate me! With that thought, I decide to call the clinic first thing tomorrow and make an appointment for an abortion. I’m not going to keep this from Evan, but I’ll be damned if I go to him without a plan to take care of it immediately.
As I make my way out of the store, I’m still freaking out. I almost want to drive around for a while to clear my head, but I promised Evan not to leave home without my security detail. I know I already broke that promise by sneaking out, but I really didn’t need anyone to witness me buying a pregnancy test, especially my security guards who report everything to Evan. What the hell am I going to do? All of a sudden, I’m shoved against my car.
“I’ve waited ten long years for this day,” a voice darkly says next to my ear. It’s Jackson! I start to struggle against his hold, but he places a cloth over my nose and mouth. I try to hold my breath, but my lungs eventually force me to take in air. Everything turns black as I pass out.
Evan
I lay in bed wide awake after finally speaking with Alani. I couldn’t sleep, thinking about how I totally fucked everything up with her—letting my fear of creating a child override my sensibility. I’m glad she’s at least working on trying to forgive me, but I was an idiot that night, pushing her away without meaning to and not thinking of how my words could be misinterpreted. I hurt her badly, making her think I didn’t want her—all because I don’t want children. It’s not something I’ll ever change my mind on, even if my reason for not wanting them is probably stupid—I have my dad to thank for that.
I had gone to my father’s house one night to confront the bastard about all the years of abuse my brothers and I endured from him. I hadn’t gone there with the intent of killing him, but I have no regrets about ending his miserable existence. Noah, the fixer, kept going back to see our father. Already a successful doctor, I think there was still a part of Noah that wanted acceptance from dear, old dad. He religiously visited twice a month, taking groceries to our dad and cleaning up the place. Each time he came from there, Noah came back worse for the wear and it would take several days for him to get out of that funk. I told him time and again to stop going, but he wouldn’t listen. It was as if he felt obligated to go, even if it killed him—which was exactly what it was slowly doing to him.
Maddox probably had it the worst out of all three of us. He had to live two years alone with our abusive father after Noah and I went away to college. Maddox never spoke about the stuff that went on during that time, but I know in my gut that it was horrible for him. How could it not have been when all of my dad’s bitterness and anger was concentrated on one person? Even though he was the youngest, Maddox was always the protector, and I know his reason for never talking about the hell he must have gone through without us was because he didn’t want Noah and me to feel guilty about leaving him behind. Maddox not only experienced the physical abuse, but he also got the emotional kind, which is far worse than any punch, kick or burn—all without his brothers to spare him some of the pain or build him back up when our dad tore into him.
My father was surprised to see me when I walked into my childhood home. I hadn’t been by to see him in years—I hated the man and couldn’t stand to be around him. Unlike Noah, I never felt like I owed our dad anything and wanted nothing to do with him.
“What do you want?” he gruffly called out from his recliner. No friendly greeting for one of his sons, barely even acknowledged my presence before he turned his attention back to the TV.
“I want some answers,” I replied. I had a million questions for him, and I wasn’t leaving until I was satisfied.
“Well, don’t hold your breath. Go on now, leave,” he easily dismissed me. Part of me snapped after that, and the other, became extremely focused. I rushed at my father, placed my arm on his chest and leaned my weight on him, effectively holding him in place.
“I’m not walking out of here tonight until you tell me why you made your children’s lives a living hell. What the fuck did we ever do to deserve that kind of treatment?” He started to struggle, trying to get me off him. I loved how karma was repaying him. My brothers and I got our size and strength from him. He was tall at 6’3” and had a strong build—he used his power and endurance when he beat us. Now, I used mine against him. Time was on my side, turning my father into a 68-year-old man who still had some bark and bite left in him, only I was much stronger now.
“You think you’re tough?” he spat out when he couldn’t shake me off.
“No, I know I’m tough, and I’m getting the answers I deserve,” I told him. Since we both knew that the power had shifted from him to me, I allowed him to push me away.
“I don’t need to tell you shit—one day, you’ll figure it out for yourself,” he responded cryptically.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” I asked irritably.
“Someday, some bitch you wind up marrying will walk out on you, and you won’t be able to stand seeing your damn kids, who look so much like the woman you hate,” he explained bitterly.
“You fucking hit us because we looked like our mother?” I angrily questioned him, disgusted by his reasoning .
“That and I never wanted you bastards in the first place. I tried talking that whore out of having children, but she insisted on it, lying to my face about loving me and wanting a family. I gave that fucking bitch everything, and she just walked out on me, leaving a note, pawning her kids off on me.”
“What did the note say?” I inquired, curious to know more about why my mother left.
“It said she never loved me, and she only married me because she thought I was going to be rich. The reason she kept having kids was so she’d get a bigger share of the inheritance I’d lied about.”
Something seemed off with what my dad said, Noah always talked about the one good memory he had as a kid—the day we went fishing with our dad. Noah remembered our dad having a good time with us and he held on to that story, believing our dad had cared about us at some point in our lives. I decided to ask the old man about it. “That day we went fishing...Noah remembers you being happy that day.”
“Well, then he’s a fool. I wasn’t happy, I was high. Trust me, being with you dumbfucks never made me happy.”
Oddly, instead of getting pissed off, what he’d revealed suddenly freed me—free of the years of abuse, free of the self-hate, and free of this man. I calmly walked back over to him and said, “You’re a pussy, and you never deserved to have kids. I’m done with you.”
“Yeah? Good for you. Now, be a good boy and grab me a beer on your way out,” he replied rudely.
“Sure, Dad,” I responded snidely as I walked to the fridge. I got the beer out of the fridge and popped the can open. I dug into my coat pocket and grabbed the prescription of Ambien I’d just picked up and placed seven pills in the can. Noah must have been there recently since the pantry was stocked. Giving the pills time to dissolve, I sarcastically asked, “You want some chips with your beer?”
“Yeah, sure. Why not?” he answered. Then, with a laugh, he added, “You should come by more often, like that brother of yours. Between the two of you, I won’t ever have to leave this recliner. My little bitches can finally be useful, waiting on me hand and foot. Maybe then, I won’t die regretting you bastards being born!”
He laughed heartily at his own joke, and it’s the same irritating laughter he had back then whenever he was being cruel to us. I handed him the bag of chips and beer and hung around for a few minutes as he ate and drank. The thing about my father was that when he drank, he always chugged the entire bottle or can down until it was done. It took several minutes, but I knew the moment he realized something wasn’t right.
“What the fuck did you do?” he asked as he put a hand to his head.
“Getting some justice and giving you what you deserve. See you in hell, asshole!” I declared. I spent the next forty-five minutes wiping any trace of my visit and listened to him take his last struggled breath of air. I took one last look around my childhood home and left. Five days later, I got a call from Noah telling me our father was found dead in his recliner and his death was ruled as a suicide.
I never regretted my actions that day, I did the world a favor by taking him out. My father made me never want to have kids because I don’t ever want to wind up like him—some bitter old man who hated the mother of his children and took it out on the kids just for looking like her. I don’t want any kid to suffer like my brothers and I did, growing up being hated by their father for something they had no control over. I don’t want to raise a child who never felt loved by their parent. I already see so much of my father’s darkness in me that I’m afraid of one day becoming him.
I look at the clock—it’s now four in the morning and I still haven’t slept. I know it’s too early, but I want to explain to Alani why I’m so fucked up about having kids. I’m not going to tell her about killing my own father, but I want her to know why just the thought of having kids scares the hell out of me. Maybe she’ll understand and be able to finally forgive me. Resolved to fixing things between us, I get out of bed to talk to her. This is just too important to wait any longer.
When I get to her bedroom, I knock on the door. She doesn’t answer, so I open the door and call out to her. After saying her name several times with no response from her, I turn on the light and discover that she’s not even there. Her bed is still made, and it doesn’t look like she ever went to bed. I take off running search the entire place for her, I even check the balcony, and she’s nowhere to be seen. I grab my phone and call Maddox, maybe she reached out to Kerrigan, and Kerrigan can tell me where to find Alani.
We’re on the phone for several minutes, still with no clue as to Alani’s whereabouts, before Brayden calls to say that Cade is missing. Maddox is rushing over to Missy and Brayden’s place while I try to find out what I can about Alani. Hoping that the two incidents are unrelated, I reason that she could have just gone to her parents’ hotel like she had previously planned. I know we aren’t exactly on the best of terms right now, so it’s still a possibility. Before I call her parents to check if they know where she is, I call the building’s security to have them pull the security video from the last time I saw her until now.
I head to the security office and wait until they’re ready for me. A million thoughts are simultaneously running through my mind. Where could she be? How could Jackson have gotten to her in my place? She’s got to be safe at her parents’ hotel. But then again, nothing seemed to be missing from her room. I watch as the security manager, David, sits down and turns on a tv screen.
“Before you came down, I pulled the video for around 11 o’clock last night when you said you spoke to her last. Here she is, leaving the building at 11:06pm,” David informs me. I look at the screen and watch Alani walk out, wearing the same clothes she had on when I talked to her. She’s not carrying an overnight bag or anything other than the small purse she always takes with her. It makes me hopeful that she planned on coming back. I have David replay the tape a few times, and the more I examine her facial expression, the more I realize that she looks anxious. Why? She doesn’t really looked scared, but more nervous, and I’m puzzled by it.
“Sir, none of the videos show her returning to the building,” David tells me.
“Thanks, David, I appreciate your help,” I say, trying to make sense of it all. As I leave the security office, I finally have to admit that the fact that Cade is missing too means that Jackson has both of them. Then and there, I vow to get Alani back safe with me. I don’t know when and I don’t know how, but I will get Alani and Cade back. Dylan, Michael, and Jackson won’t get away with this—I’m ending their miserable lives. Just like I did to my own father.